


Zero

by Symph95



Category: SK8 the Infinity (Anime)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Injury, Character Death, Death Counter, Hurt/Comfort without the Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 01:08:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29198886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Symph95/pseuds/Symph95
Summary: Langa hates the number zero. Yet, he sees it everywhere. It flashes by on the wrists of all those who surround him. He looks away when it does, not wanting to see if it’s stopped. The number itself is not so much a problem, more so the emptiness behind it. The heart-stopping nature of nothing.
Relationships: Hasegawa Langa/Kyan Reki
Comments: 4
Kudos: 98





	Zero

**Author's Note:**

> Well hello there! I have fallen into Sk8, and I can't get out. Reki and Langa own my heart now and of course that means I must make angst. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy!

Langa hates the number zero. Yet, he sees it everywhere. It flashes by on the wrists of all those who surround him. He looks away when it does, not wanting to see if it’s stopped. The number itself is not so much a problem, more so the emptiness behind it. The heart-stopping nature of nothing.

He finds one scribbled on his worksheet, pulling his attention solely to the paper. He doesn’t notice anything around him or that the bell has rung. It takes the teacher to tell him to go for him to finally realize any change occurs, and he’s fortunate for the interruption because Langa would be late to his job interview otherwise.

His mother bought him a motorcycle the day he moved. He argued against it, but she insisted he has something to drive and, well… their other options were slim. So he’s stuck with it.

He shouldn’t be nervous about it, but he is. The streets are unfamiliar, the shops in a language his eyes aren’t accustomed to, and everything is switched. But he needs a job.

It’s supposed to be at a calligraphy shop presumably writing calligraphy, at least that was all Langa can remember from the job search profile.

Inside, the space is cramped with wooden walls and mats. He is told to take a seat across from a pink-haired man going by the name Sakurayashiki. 

Langa places his bag on the floor before couching. As he does so, he looks. He doesn’t mean to, but preferably he wishes for a stable source of income.

On the man’s wrist are small digits traced with thin font. It’s white and pure as snow. There’s a bunch of them, telling of a long life. Langa’s shoulders lose their tension as fresh air fills his lungs.

Sadly, the job won’t hire minors. The man apologizes. Langa says it’s fine, though somewhere in his mind mutters about the pay and security of the job. But he’s sure security won’t be of his worries. The lowest digits he’s seen thus far in Japan were in the hundreds and traced into the skin of elderly men and women.

He exits the shop, brain wandering. In his headspace, he doesn’t hear the roar of wheels until it’s crunching by his feet. A voice follows.

“Hey, could you get that?”

Langa looks between the kid flying towards him and the board slipping away. He blinks before registering the comment and complying, grabbing the board before it could any farther.

In his hands, he stares at the top; the weight in his hands is nice. It feels familiar, fitting into his palms like an old gift. Perhaps the board is a distorted dream.

“You saved my butt transfer student,” the boy says, finally catching up. He scratches at the back of his neck with an arm wrapped in a cast. Laughter peals from him.

He introduces himself as Reki and is, apparently, a classmate. Langa doesn’t recognize him, but he isn’t sure if he remembers anyone in his class. Yet his brain can’t delve into the topic as Reki continues talking, announcing that the item in Langa’s hands is a skateboard. Langa’s lost even with an explanation, so Reki demonstrates that “yes indeed you can stand on it” by jumping over Langa’s head with it. 

Watching it fly sparks an old interest in Langa. It digs at a chest he believes to be buried.

When Langa gets up, Reki tries coaxing him into buying one. He says he has a job at a skate shop, immediately perking up Langa. He asks to work with him. Then he is. His task is to deliver a skateboard at midnight to an underground race with Reki. It’s simple and pays well so Langa tolerates Reki’s antics for a bit. He lazily listens to Reki's talk about skating as though it were his sole purpose in life. The words trickle from his mind onto the pavement. Reki, however, continues to explain what the ‘S’ races are, and with the dangerous and illegal labels placed on the event, Langa considers backing out. But he needs a job and that chest he hid away a while ago is resurfacing in his mind. 

Reki catches him staring at the board before they leave, but Langa denies it, telling him they have to go. Yet the skateboard pricks at a distant memory he wants to relive.

They ride to the hill where ‘S’ takes place and deliver the item, or at least they deliver something. A mix-up on Reki’s part results in them only possessing Reki’s skateboard instead of the correct one. And someone needs to skate.

So Langa volunteers.

With his feet strapped to the board tight and secure, he takes off down the course. Memories of a thill long before he knew the meaning of the number zero fill his mind and chest and heart. It whispers to him to come back for it is safe. He can open his heart again. He can open his trust again.

And so with a great leap, he falls like snow down the mountain.

When Langa agrees to go to Reki’s house, it is the first time in years he’d visited someone he could consider himself close with. After Langa’s leap, skating and Reki merged. There is no one without the other.

“Should I sit somewhere specific?” Langa asks as he toes the door of Reki’s room. 

Reki looks up at him from where he digs through his drawers in a hoodie. Langa’s skin bristles with uncertainty.

“What?” Reki asks.

“Do I have to sit in a certain place?”

Reki questions him for a moment before peals in laughter. It’s high and knowing, and Langa’s face caves with it, yet his ears perk at the sound.

“Why would there be that? This isn’t school. Sit wherever, but don’t get comfy. I still have to make a board for you.”

Oh, Langa remembers now. The board. For him. To be made by someone else.

Perhaps trust isn’t such a bad thing. 

Trust, Langa learns, becomes a good feeling. It is skating and bailing but Reki is waiting with bandages. It is the pavement greeting him but Reki picking him back up. It is Reki coaching him and recording him and giving him names for the board he created for him. 

It is sitting at sunset while the hours fall away. It’s forgetting those numbers exist and that they’re even there at all.

“Adam is dangerous.”

Joe gives Reki that warning the day before their beef.

They’re at the park again, and Langa can’t get those words out of his head.

“What are you going to do with his warning?” Langa asks. 

“I’m not backing down that easily,” Reki says. “I’m wiping that grin right off his face.”

And Langa smiles because he believes him. 

He doesn’t see Reki’s sweatshirt drop just a hair that evening with single digits counting down.

Langa follows Reki back to the race, placing his trust in him that he will do well because that’s what he expects. Adam is there with a smug grin and eyes all over him. He doesn’t even consider Reki’s presence. Langa can feel it, but he knows he has another thing coming to him.

And then Adam and Reki are racing; well, only Reki goes at first. Adam takes a cigarette between his teeth to enjoy the taste, and Langa’s stomach begins to churn.

Suddenly, in the flash of an eye, Adam is upon Reki, wedging his board underneath and grabbing Reki’s wrist. The camera shows his skin which is pale to everyone else. But Langa sees a single red digit, and the whole world freezes. He doesn’t think, doesn’t care; he simply takes the closest vehicle he can find and speeds after them. He urges the bike as fast as it can go, ice tearing through his stomach and threatening to stop his heart.

He can’t be too late. Not now.

They appear before him, or at least Reki is. But a moment passes and Adam launches towards him. His board charges at Reki with the speed of a frenzied bull.

Milliseconds before they collide, Reki’s board slips away as he flies through the air. 

The crack shatters the night; it snaps like a whip. The sound screeches into Langa’s ears, staying there in an infinite loop, and he sees an angle that no longer bears life.

“Reki!”

His body hits the ground, rolling once, twice, and finishing its third time before finally stopping. Rocks crunch under him.

Langa throws the motorcycle to the ground and is upon Reki in an instant. Red stains the ground, pooling down from Reki’s head. Langa keeps himself from wrenching as he stares at the twisted angle of Reki’s neck. 

He doesn’t even need to feel a pulse to know he’s gone; the numbers tell him. They’re black and broken, empty in their value. 

And as Reki’s taken away, Langa knows he hates the number zero. He hates it because he sees it before death. His dad died with it and now the one he loved did as well. 

**Author's Note:**

> Skateboarding becoming deadly I suppose. Sorry for the angst I can't help myself hue hue hue. Anyways, I hope you all enjoyed! See you soon and stay safe!


End file.
